


Black Smoke Cat

by Claminosity



Category: Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (Movies)
Genre: Age Difference, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Non-Magical, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, M/M, Mutual Pining, Slow Burn
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-11-09
Updated: 2019-05-13
Packaged: 2019-08-20 19:33:00
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 15,881
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16561931
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Claminosity/pseuds/Claminosity
Summary: Graves is a washed-up NYPD detective with a haunted past. Credence is an enigmatic young man with a mischievous black cat. After a chance encounter, Graves finds himself irresistibly drawn to Credence, but what is the boy hiding?





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Story originally inspired by [Dakotaliar's art](http://dakotaliar.tumblr.com/post/153994938179/modern-au-where-credence-is-a-strange-quiet-boy).
> 
> Many thanks to my beta teithiwr!

He finds the cat on an early December morning as he’s rushing out the door to get to the precinct. Just a movement in the corner of his eye, a shift in the shadows next to the stairs leading up to his brownstone. Graves expects another fucking raccoon, the hungry and hissing kind that Brooklyn is infested with, but it’s a sleek, dark cat crouching in the shadow of a potted cypress. Some kind of modern oriental breed with dainty features, short velvety fur and ears that appear slightly too big for its head. Its jewel-like eyes glint at him from its hiding place.

“Hey, buddy. Whatcha doin’ here?”

Graves has never really understood the appeal of keeping pets, nor is he particularly fond of cats. But the chill of New York City winters has already set in, and this definitely looks like an indoor cat. Someone is bound to be missing it. Graves takes a tentative step towards it. The cat growls low, retreats further into the shadows and lets out a hiss to make a final point.

“Fine, suit yourself.” He doesn’t have the time to chase lost cats anyway. If he makes a run for it, he might still beat the worst flood of Brooklyn’s commuters to the subway.

The cat is still there when he makes it back in the early evening. This time it announces itself with a rusty-sounding meow and slinks regally from its corner to stop directly in front of Graves’ shoes, looking up at him expectantly.

“Oh, now you want my help? I guess a day out in the cold made you reconsider,” he says, all the while questioning the wisdom in talking to a cat. Maybe his therapist is right and he really has spent too much time in isolation lately. Graves makes a mental note to make more of an effort to engage with actual human beings, lest he turn into Old Reggie who can be seen shouting at squirrels in Prospect Park.

He crouches down and carefully reaches for the cat’s collar.

“You’d better not have rabies,” he mutters. The cat stays still, though, and lets him turn the collar to see the oval metal label attached to it. It reads OBSCURUS, and the flip side has an address on a street just a couple of blocks away.

“Okay, kitty. I’m going to pick you up now, but if you scratch me I’m throwing you right back in the gutter.” The cat nuzzles his hand and gives it a little, sandpapery lick.

Graves follows the address down to where the neat terraced houses begin to give way to less well maintained apartment buildings with rusty fire escapes and peeling facades. It’s not an area he frequents, since everything he needs is on the better lit side of the neighborhood. The cat has dug its claws in his cashmere blend coat, but at least it’s docile enough to let itself be carried and isn’t struggling to escape.

He arrives at a nondescript, gray apartment building. There’s no answer from the cat owner’s apartment on the intercom, but he gets a solicitous neighbor to buzz him in. He finds the right door on the third floor, at the end of a hallway covered in cracked, orange tiles probably installed in the 70s. Graves has knocked on the doors of countless strangers in his line of work, even busted their doors in a few cases, so he’s not sure why he feels strangely tense knocking on this one.

He has time to acquaint himself with the faded tags on the wall before the door cracks open to reveal a slight young man, maybe an inch or two taller than him, with a mop of dark hair fringing a pale, striking face. Graves thinks his haircut might be one of those intentionally ugly hipster styles, but the rest of his presence doesn’t really radiate ironic self-awareness. The boy blinks at him in the dim light of the hallway. His face is steeped in confusion, then relief as he sees the cat in Graves’ arms, blue-black fur against the black of his coat.

“Hi. I believe this belongs to you,” says Graves.

Their fingers brush briefly as the boy accepts the cat, which immediately nuzzles its face into the crook of his neck and begins to purr loudly. The boy hugs the animal back with weird intensity, as if momentarily forgetting about Graves altogether. Finally he lifts his face from the fur and looks up, slightly dazed.

“He keeps running away,” the boy explains. “The window to the fire escape doesn’t lock properly, so…uh. Thank you, Mr…”

“Graves. Just call me Graves.”

“Thank you, Mr. Graves.”

“Not at all.”

The boy doesn’t offer his name, and before Graves can ask, he’s retreating into the apparent safety beyond the door.

“I think I should feed him now, so. Thank you again.”

The door closes as unexpectedly as it had opened, leaving Graves standing alone in the dingy, yellow light.

“You’re welcome,” he says to the empty hallway.

During the days that follow, Graves begins to spot the boy around the neighborhood. Buying coffee at the corner bodega, crossing the park wrapped in a thick, black scarf, disappearing down the steps to the subway to be swallowed by the ever-moving stream of people. Graves knows he must be in his early twenties, but this is how he’s come to think of him: The Boy. He could swear he never saw him before, but now he is everywhere, a reappearing vision like a ghost, yet just as elusive. Graves thinks about catching up to him, asking after his cat, asking him about anything. He never does.

Instead, he thinks about the boy in passing when he sits at his desk at the precinct shuffling meaningless paperwork, drinking burnt coffee from the break room. He goes by the deli on his way home, gets the same soup most nights, eats it in the kitchen with the TV on mute. The lightbulb in his hallway has needed changing for the past month, but he can manage just fine in the dark, so he doesn’t bother.

About a week and a half later, he returns home to find the cat perched at the top of the stoop, cleaning itself with a delicate paw. When it sees Graves, it makes a chirruping sound and winds itself around his legs, probably coating his immaculately pressed trousers in hair. He sighs, picks the cat up and tucks it inside his coat.

“Hi. We really have to stop meeting like this,” says Graves.

The boy’s pale face relaxes into a soft smile. He opens the door wider to let Graves in.

The Boy, it turns out, is called Credence. The flat behind the door reveals itself to be a little studio apartment, almost Spartan in its lack of furniture, sparse like a monk’s chamber. The most expensive piece of decor is probably the elaborate scratching post situated in a corner farthest from the windows. The place is almost obsessively neat, though, clearly kept by someone who places cleanliness next to godliness. What really strikes Graves as odd is the glaring lack of electronics. For the apartment of a millennial, it’s curiously devoid of phone chargers, laptops, modems or speakers. There’s not even an old television in front of the tiny, worn sofa. Similarly curious is the absence of art reproductions, postcard collages or framed photos: the walls are bare save for the peeling wall paper. A chair next to a futon in the corner holds an orderly stack of library books.

The boy is making tea for them in his kitchenette. Graves hears the click of the gas stove, the sound of mugs clinking.

“I’m glad you came back, Mr. Graves. I’ve been thinking about you,” says Credence, turning to face him.

“Oh?” Graves can’t help smiling a little, lifting an eyebrow. The boy splutters, rushing to explain.

“What I mean is, it’s been bothering me I was so impolite the first time you brought Ozzy back. It’s just that I’d been so worried about him. Usually, he finds his own way home, but that time he was gone for longer than before. So, I’m sorry about that…and for troubling you a second time,” he says, worrying his full lower lip apologetically. It’s incredibly attractive in a way Graves is sure the boy is completely unaware of.

“I really don’t mind,” says Graves, and finds that he really doesn’t. With every passing minute spent in the boy’s company, he grows more curious.

Surreptitiously, he inspects the neat stack of books next to the immaculately made bed. (Not many would manage hospital corners on a futon, but Credence has.) It’s an eclectic mix of prose, poetry and nonfiction on various subjects ranging from aviation history to evolutionary biology. _Middlemarch_ by George Eliot. _The Lord of the Rings_ by Tolkien. _Wonderful Life_ by Stephen Jay Gould. A collection of 19th-century Romantics that Graves would only pick up if the alternative were a phone book.

The boy brings him a mug of green tea: sencha, if the delicate, grassy scent is any indication.

“Have you tried blocking the window?” asks Graves after thanking him for the tea. “Your cat seems pretty resourceful considering, you know…his lack of opposable thumbs.”

“The window’s too high up to prop anything against it, and Ozzy knows how to open the latch. Duct tape only slows him down. Short of shutting him in the bathroom when I’m gone nothing seems to work, and he really hates that,” says Credence. He is crouched on the floor, letting the cat rub its ears against his hand.

“But I guess that’s what I’ll have to do from now on,” he continues, sadly.

“He’s important to you,” says Graves.

“I don’t have many friends,” says Credence, smiling softly down at the creature nuzzling his slender fingers.

The statement sounds melancholy, yet matter-of-fact, somehow utterly devoid of self-pity. It tugs at something inside Graves, at the place he’d long given up as a stone garden.

“Mr. Graves, may I ask what it is you do?” asks Credence.

Graves can see the boy curiously looking him over, though sadly not for any of the usual reasons. He is still in his work clothes, although he’s abandoned his charcoal suit jacket on the arm of the sofa. Without the telltale shoulder holster, his daily uniform of a well-cut suit, crisp shirt with an understated tie, and Italian leather shoes likely makes him indistinguishable from an investment banker in a civilian’s eyes.

“Law enforcement,” Graves replies. “I’m a detective with the NYPD.”

From vast experience, Graves knows you can tell a lot from a person by how they react to this piece of information. For instance, if approached in the course of an investigation, they may become helpful and jovial to the point of suspicion, or suddenly sit up rigidly and try very hard not to look at the cookie tin with the weed hidden in it. Some people you meet socially lean in hungrily and start subtly grilling you for grimy details, others want to know why their neighborhood is going to hell and why nothing is being done about it.

Credence, for his part, only seems momentarily taken aback, then nods. “Oh. Wow. I guess I know two detectives now.”

“Really?” asks Graves.

“Tina, my landlady, lives upstairs. She’s with the NYPD too.”

Graves inquires after her last name, but he’s never heard of a Detective Goldstein. It’s hardly surprising given the number of cops employed by the NYPD, but he wonders if it’s a coincidence that this mysterious boy of obviously limited means is living in a centrally located, if somewhat shabby apartment owned by one.

“Your detective friend, have you known her a long time?” asks Graves.

As he suspected, something about this line of questioning seems to make Credence uneasy.

“Just eight months. That’s about how long I’ve lived here,” says Credence, fiddling with the sleeve of his worn sweater.

“You know, I only live a few blocks away, but I don’t really know this part of the neighborhood. Do you like it here?” asks Graves, taking a step back from the interrogation.

Credence visibly relaxes, the sudden tension melting from his shoulders. “I do. This is really the first home I’ve had to myself. I can’t afford it really, but Tina and Queenie, her sister, are really nice people.”

The boy goes on to talk about the sisters for a moment longer, easily deduced to be the most important social contact he has. Queenie, he tells Graves, is a hairdresser who secured Credence a part time job at her salon. (“It’s just cleaning and answering the phone and stuff,” he says, modest.)

It’s strange how easy it is to talk to Credence. Graves finds himself reading his subtle cues, noticing when to encourage him by showing keen interest and when to allow his natural reticence to take over, allowing them to smoothly sail over topics that may be too intimate for a first encounter. The sky outside the window grows darker, Graves’ tea goes cold.

Credence. An unusual name for an unusual person, Graves thinks. He went to college with a girl named Temperance, so he knows that with frequent use even strange virtue names become names just like any other. With something of a startle he realizes the boy hasn’t mentioned his last name.

When Graves voices the question, there’s a frown between the boy’s dark brows. “Um…Barebone. It’s not the name I was born with, though. I’m thinking about changing it. Do you have a first name, Mr. Graves?” asks Credence in turn, in a way that coming from someone else Graves might interpret as flirtatious.

“Would you believe me if I said no?” says Graves.

“Come on. It can’t possibly be any weirder than mine,” says Credence, the corner of his mouth quirking.

Graves tries not to grimace too much as he pulls a business card out of his wallet and hands it to Credence.

“Percival. Like the knight. That’s not so bad. Do people call you by it?”

“Never twice,” says Graves.

“So…everyone calls you Graves? Even your family?” asks Credence, still peering at the business card in his hand. It’s heavy stock with an embossed NYPD logo, ordered from the printer by Graves himself. He absently thinks of changing his cards into something less flashy, given his recent decline in professional prestige.

“Don’t have much in the way of family left,” Graves finally replies, impassive. ”But most of my colleagues do.”

Credence ducks his head, abashed. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to ask such a personal question.”

“It’s fine,” says Graves. ”For what it’s worth, my parents called me Percy. You can, too, if you want.”

Graves feels faintly surprised at himself, unsure this is what he meant to say, but Credence seems very pleased by the offer. Being in the presence of the boy seems to draw all kinds of unexpected and alarming reactions from him.

The thought is interrupted by the feeling of four small paws pressing on Graves’ thighs. At some point the cat has jumped onto the sofa next to him, too light for him to notice before it’s clambering over his lap. He’s still not enthusiastic about getting hair on his suit, but at this point it’s probably a lost cause.

“Obscurus! Sorry, let me get him off you,” says Credence, cringing.

“It’s okay,” says Graves, letting the animal’s soft back slide against his palm. The feeling is surprisingly sensual. He can even feel the slight vibrations of the cat’s purring against his hand. The sensation is not entirely without charm, Graves thinks as he scratches behind the cat’s ear, making the animal push its head into his palm in pleasure.

“Why do you think he came back to me?” he asks Credence.

“Who knows why cats do anything?” says Credence. “He seems to like you, though. He probably remembered where you live.”

There’s something feline about Credence himself, Graves thinks, in his dark eyes, his graceful features, his solitary existence. He feels the sudden, absurd urge to pet the boy’s ridiculous hair in turn, to see if he, too, would push into his hand.

This, he decides, is his sign to leave – before his equilibrium is shaken in a way that can’t be righted with a glass of whisky.

At the door, Credence cautiously turns to him.

“Mr Graves…Percy. I hope I’m not being too…presumptuous or anything, but…” The boy draws breath, lets the rest spill out of him like he’s ripping off a band-aid. “I don’t know that many people around here. Just Tina and Queenie, really. And I think tonight is the most I’ve talked with anyone since…ever. So, um. If you’d ever like to…” He looks at the wall, fiddling with the holes in his cuffs.

Graves thinks about the reputation he knows he has within the force, or used to, at least: formidable, unyielding, something of an immovable object. Maybe his time off the field has let some of his rough edges turn less jagged, sanded down to something you could lean against without bruising your back. Or maybe none of that matters, since this boy appears to have some innate, intuitive way of utterly disarming him.

“I’d love to, Credence. You have my card now, my private number is on the reverse side. To be honest, I’m not doing much outside of office hours at the moment, so you can call or text me anytime.”

“Oh. I don’t…I don’t have a cell phone,” says Credence, embarrassed.

“Oh,” says Graves. Of course, he should have remembered the lack electronic paraphernalia in the flat. There had been no phone number on Obscurus’ collar, either.

“I’m around most evenings, though, so…If you’re ever in the neighborhood,” says Credence, in a hopeful tone.

“I’ll make sure I am,” says Graves.

The wind is biting on his way back home, throwing strands of his hair out of its slicked-back arrangement, but he barely notices. There’s something about this young man and the small world he seems to inhabit, like finding a hidden room in a house whose blueprints you thought you knew in intimate detail. The encounter has left Graves with a tingling sense of curiosity, a growing desire to take a closer look inside. The feeling is a novel one: it’s been years, perhaps, since the last time he’s felt the need to seek this kind of familiarity with someone else’s life. Graves prefers to think of himself as an aesthete as opposed to merely shallow, but it doesn’t hurt that the boy is extremely easy on the eyes. It’s impossible not to feel flattered by his interest, whether it’s brought on by attraction or loneliness or a mixture of the two.

When he falls asleep that night, his last thoughts before drifting off are of soft, brown eyes and the silky feeling of fur against his skin.

—

 

For the next few days everything remains much as it were, work followed by the subway followed by deli soup in his quiet kitchen. At the precinct, the whirlpool of daily comings and goings, of ringing phones and shouted conversations, remains beyond his solitary bubble. Amidst the ocean of endless police work in a city of millions, his desk is an island upon whose sands the flotsam of unsolvable cases and tedious investigations eventually drifts. This suits Graves more than well.

Even in his previous, active role as a detective, he always had to make a conscious effort to be a part of the team spirit so essential to a group of cops working together. Since his medical leave and subsequent return to a desk job, it’s been easy enough to exclude himself from the camaraderie of shared lunches, shop talk and beers after shifts. His fellow detectives don’t avoid him, exactly, but they don’t seek his company or his consultation, either. It’s as if they believe his rotten luck could be contagious, or that they might end up in a dreaded discussion about What Happened.

Since the silence in his private life has been similarly static for as long as he can remember, Graves nearly convinces himself that the urge to return to Credence’s dingy little place for more tea and conversation is only a quirk, a case of curiosity rather than an actual need for human contact. In any case, he thinks he's read somewhere that you’re expected to wait three days before calling a date back, and even though he’s not certain that rule applies to this situation, he doesn’t want to seem too eager.

Graves intends to wait a full week before making a reappearance, but in the end he doesn’t want to give the boy a chance to forget about him, either. This is why, come Friday, he makes his way back to the block with the peeling walls and rusty fire escapes. Most people Credence’s age would be spending a Friday night with their friends, on dates or enjoying the many delights of New York’s night life, but Graves already knows the boy to not be like most of his peers. For a moment at Credence’s door he thinks he may have made too many assumptions, as there’s no answer to his first or second knock. Just as he’s about to abandon his mission and swallow an unexpected lump of disappointment, there’s the sound of a door opening upstairs, of hurried footsteps descending.

“Hi, sorry, I thought that was my door,” says Credence, bounding down the stairs and nearly colliding with Graves at the landing.

“Is this a bad time?” asks Graves.

“Oh, no, I was just upstairs listening to some old records with Queenie,” says Credence. “I’m not doing anything tonight,” he clarifies, quietly beaming at Graves in a way that warms him from the inside.

“In that case, can I take you to dinner?”

Graves can see Credence bite his lovely lower lip in order not to let his responding smile take over his entire face, and mentally punches the air like Bender at the end of The Breakfast Club. Out loud, he mildly suggests a small Moroccan place a few blocks over.

Under the softly glowing lamps of the restaurant, Credence talks a fair deal about Queenie, how she thinks it’s a crime not to know Nina Simone and Billie Holiday and is educating Credence accordingly. His tone is openly admiring, and for a moment Graves wonders if there’s something there, but Credence seems to think of the woman as an older sister more than anything else. Once Credence pauses, seemingly run out of Queenie-related things to say, Graves understands he’s been babbling about someone other than himself to disguise his nervousness. It’s very sweet, and Graves wants to take his hand over the table, but manages to stop himself, grabbing the pepper shaker instead. (After a glance at the menu, Credence asks Graves to choose for him, and he orders an elaborate dish of eggplant and lamb kofta, the eggplant slices cooked to butter softness in olive oil. Watching Credence eat it is a joy of its own. It’s when he’s watching the bliss on Credence’s face that Graves decides he needs to feed the boy as frequently as possible.)

Graves exchanges a few words in French with the owner in part just to impress Credence, who seems satisfyingly taken with his language skills. They stay for sweet mint tea, and at the end of the evening Graves walks Credence back to his apartment building like the gentleman his mother raised him to be. He doesn’t get a kiss goodnight, but Credence shyly asks if he’d like to do something on Monday night, which is almost as rewarding.

Mondays and Fridays with Credence become a semi-regular arrangement. On these days, instead of the deli with its single cup of split pea, Graves sometimes stops by his favorite Vietnamese restaurant and takes dinner with him to the little studio. He’d gladly take Credence out to eat, but it seems the boy is more comfortable with being treated by Graves when he doesn’t have to actually witness the transaction or awkwardly offer to cover his half of the check.

Credence is not well versed in the various culinary offerings of Brooklyn, but he is open to everything, and Graves delights in introducing him to foods he hasn’t tried before. He shows Credence how to eat with chopsticks, which the boy picks up quickly, but not before Graves has had an opportunity or two to guide his lovely, slender fingers by hand.

Graves finds out about his past in remarks and asides, scattered in conversation like puzzle pieces, but they never quite amount to a full picture. Credence is twenty-three years old, which at times makes Graves’ own thirty-nine feel somewhat ancient. He says he grew up in foster care, but is no longer in contact with his foster family. He has never been to college, and has a high school diploma barely scraped together like a patchwork from bits of home schooling and time spent in a string of public schools. From the scraps of information he is able to collect, Graves forms the image of a restrictive, puritanically religious home, but the subject makes Credence seem like his world is suddenly darkened some private storm cloud, so after a couple of careful tries he leaves it alone.

Instead, they talk about books that Credence has been reading, the movies he’s seen, the records Queenie has played him that week. Graves is not up to date on the latest New York Times bestsellers or the popular HBO shows of the moment, but as Credence’s tastes seem to veer towards the classics, they manage to find enough common ground. Especially films seem like an art form Credence has discovered recently.

There’s a cinema nearby that screens old black and white movies that is Credence’s particular favorite. They go there together once at Graves’ suggestion, but the film being screened that night, The Night of the Hunter, seems to upset Credence. The story with its murderous preacher and the children running from him is unsettling, and Graves himself has never been able to hear the hymn ’Leaning on the Everlasting Arms’ without chills running up his spine ever since he first saw the film as a teenager, but there seems to be something more to Credence’s mood. He’s quiet after they leave the theater, wrapping himself in his scarf and declining an offer of drinks at a nearby café. He even politely but resolutely refuses Graves’ offer of walking him home, saying not to bother as it would be out of his way, smiling tightly as he says a fast goodnight without any of the usual lingering. Graves watches his receding form, hunched against the chill wind, for as long as he’s visible in the street lights, wanting to run after him, to hug him or to shake him for answers – he is not sure.

It occurs to Graves he could invite Credence into his own house with its flat screen TV and the full range of classics on Netflix, but he likes the intimacy of Credence’s studio. Furthermore, when he thinks of Credence in his own home, watching movies with him sprawled on the sofa in the dim light from the TV, his mind inevitably turns to date night scenarios where the movie is eventually forgotten in favor of more physically intimate pastimes. Somehow he doesn’t trust his self-restraint as much on his own turf as in Credence’s little home, and while he sometimes gets the sense that Credence might in time be open to such developments in their relationship, he doesn’t want to scare him away by rushing anything.

And, as much as Graves would love to wake up next to Credence in his bed (should he be lucky enough to lure him there), he can’t ignore the different kind of risk he’d be taking: The nights when he wakes up tangled in sweat soaked sheets, gasping for air, for those first moments of wakefulness convinced that he’s trapped underground with no way out, before the lingering shadowy tendrils of the dream recede and the darkness becomes the ordinary darkness of his bedroom. Those nights come less frequently now, but they still happen with discouraging regularity. This is something he won’t expose anyone else to, least of all Credence.

For now, he decides, it’s enough to be near this captivating boy, to spend time with him and to be allowed the occasional and fleeting friendly touch. And if nothing else ever comes of it, he’ll still be glad to know him. Graves tries his best to suppress the part of him that still desperately wants something else to happen, that keeps wishing for Credence to definitively give him the green light.

(Once, after a glass of red wine, Credence gives him a hug with a shy kiss on the cheek as he’s leaving. For days after, he finds himself absently touching that spot on his cheek as he’s sitting at his desk at work or riding the subway.)

—-

Graves never refuses a cup of coffee or tea when he visits Credence. He likes to watch the boy potter around in his kitchenette, usually closely followed by the ever curious Obscurus. Graves finds the domesticity soothing. The dilapidated little flat in a crumbling bit of Brooklyn has become a still world at the center of his much larger, more chaotic one. The scent of espresso is filling the small space. He watches as Credence takes the moka pot off the stove, careful not to burn his fingers. The cat chooses this moment to find out exactly what is happening at human eye level.

“Obscurus, NO.” Credence gently pushes the cat with his elbow until it jumps back onto the floor, tail swishing, then reaches for two mugs on an upper shelf. The movement makes his sweater ride up and reveal a narrow strip of pale skin, the jut of a hip bone.

Graves fervently does not think about putting his mouth on that spot.

The cat jumps back on the counter as soon as Credence’s back is turned.

Credence sets two steaming mugs on the rickety coffee table and sits next to him on the tiny, worn couch. It’s barely big enough for two, so their knees are constantly brushing. Credence never seems to mind.

“You work in a hair salon some of the time, don’t you?” says Graves.

“Yeah, just a couple of days a week. Why?”

“Credence, I hope you don’t mind me saying this, but you’re far too good looking to have this hair,” says Graves, teasing. “I mean, look at you. No one blessed with those cheekbones should be allowed to resemble a Beatles cover band reject.”

He takes the opportunity to sweep some of the dark mop off the boy’s temple. Credence doesn’t seem perturbed by the intimacy of the gesture, so he lets his nails slowly, gently graze along his scalp until his fingers come to rest at the nape of his neck.

Credence flushes adorably, looks at his knees. The small smile playing on his lips is half-pleased, half-embarrassed.

“It used to look even worse, if you can believe it,” he says, brushing off Graves’ compliment.  
“Queenie has offered to cut it for me several times, but…I find it difficult, to let her.”

Credence is holding his coffee mug in both hands, staring at the reflections of light on the black surface.

”It bothers me to be touched by other people. Sometimes.”

“Oh,” says Graves.

He quickly withdraws his hand from where his thumb has been rubbing small circles in the soft, curling hair at the base of Credence’s skull.

“Oh, no, I didn’t mean you,” says Credence, turning to face Graves, urgent.

Credence takes a slow breath as if to gather his courage before his hand finds Graves’ where it’s resting on the couch. His fingers are warm from the coffee mug, his touch light like a hummingbird on a leaf. Even so, it sends a jolt of electricity through Graves’ body.

“I like it, when it’s you. Touching me,” says Credence, quietly.

Graves looks into the boy’s half-lidded eyes, at his lightly parted lips. He can hear them both breathing. Somewhere down in the street, a car door slams. He swallows.

There’s a rapping at the door. A woman’s voice echoes outside in the hallway.  
“Credence, are you in?”


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Many thanks to my invaluable beta Sara/teithiwr, who fixes my tenses and makes my prose legible. <3

Credence seems to blink himself awake. He gets up and goes to open the door. Graves immediately misses the feeling of the boy’s hand on his.  
  
The voice who called his name belongs to a tall brunette in dark slacks and white shirt. She’s peering past Credence into the flat, curious brown eyes trained on Graves.  
  
“Hi, Tina.”  
  
“Hey. I’m sorry, I didn’t realize you had company.”  
  
“Oh. Yeah. Tina, this is Percy Graves. He works for the NYPD, like you.”  
  
Graves gets off the sofa and extends a hand. “Nice to meet you.”  
  
“Tina Goldstein,” she says, frowning as she gives the offered hand a brief squeeze. “Can I ask what brings you here? Cree’s not in any trouble, is he?”  
  
“Don’t worry, ma’am, strictly a social call,” Graves says.  
  
“I see,” says Goldstein. She takes in the scene, two mugs on the table next to the small sofa. Suspicion is written on her face. There’s nothing incriminating about any of it, yet Graves feels oddly like he just got caught with a half-dressed prom date by a disapproving parent.  
  
”Credence, I just came to tell you you’re welcome to join us for dinner. It’s Queenie’s turn to cook, so it should be good,” Goldstein says.  
  
“That sounds great, but…” Credence looks at Graves, uncertain.    
  
“I should be going,” Graves says. From Goldstein’s awkward sideways stance, it seems like the dinner invitation won’t be spontaneously extended to Graves, and far be it from him to intrude.  
  
“Well then,” says Goldstein. “Come upstairs in an hour, Cree?”  
  
When Goldstein has gone, Graves says Credence a quick goodbye, their previous air of intimacy having dissipated with the interruption. At least Credence seems reluctant to let him go and quietly apologetic about his friend’s coolness towards Graves.  
  
To Graves’ surprise, when he closes the door behind him, he finds Goldstein waiting for him at the landing. “Detective Graves, is it? May I have a word?”  
  
—  
  
She leads him up the stairs to her apartment, out of the echoing hallway and out of Credence’s earshot. He doesn’t get an invitation beyond the foyer, though. Goldstein stops next to a messy coat rack in a hallway filled with impractical-looking footwear that looks like it belongs to someone else. Beyond it, Graves can glimpse a living room that looks weirdly grandmotherly in decor, all tiffany lamps, doilies and heavy oak furniture.  
  
Goldstein wastes no time on further pleasantries, having evidently used up her day’s supply downstairs.  
  
“What exactly is your interest in Credence?” she fires, arms bunched up like she’s afraid of inadvertently punching something unless she takes proper precautions.  
  
“Excuse me?” says Graves.  
  
“You say you’re not here in an official capacity, Detective Graves, and frankly, I’d be furious if you were. Because that shit with the church was well and truly put to rest. None of it was down to Credence, and he needs to be left alone.”  
  
Graves feels like the floor under him has momentarily tilted. The church? What was put to rest? Not wanting to reveal his ignorance, he places the mystery in the back pocket of his mind and brushes past it, determined to find out later.  
  
“Like I said, Detective Goldstein, I’m not here as a cop. You seem to think of Credence as some kind of…Dickensian orphan, but he’s an adult,” Graves says. “He’s allowed to have friends, and he’s perfectly capable of choosing them for himself.”  
  
Detective Goldstein clucks her tongue. Her stare could bore holes into the fleur de lys-patterned  wall behind Graves.  
  
“Friends. Okay. Well, Credence may be an adult, but he’s not exactly been out in the world for very long. He may not always know what, or _who_ , is good for him. He may not always catch on to what other people _want_.”  
  
“Detective Goldstein – Tina – I only want what you want. I want him to be safe and happy.”  
  
Graves pauses for emphasis, watches a succession of emotions flicker on Goldstein’s expressive face. “I can see how special he is and I care about him, same as you,” he continues.  
  
Goldstein seems to consider this. Finally she nods, unbunching her arms, apparently placated for the time being.  
  
“I’m sorry I came at you like this. It’s just…he’s been hurt so much. I can’t have him hurt again on my watch.”  
  
Goldstein’s eyes suddenly have a suspicious shine to them. _God, please, don’t cry. I’ll have to bolt straight through the door like a fucking Looney Tunes character_ , Graves thinks.  
  
“It’s fine, I understand. But, for the record, I think you underestimate Credence.”  
  
Goldstein shakes her head.  
  
“I’m getting the feeling you don’t have the full story, Graves. It’s not my place to enlighten you, but tread carefully. I’ve known him for longer than you, and he’s more fragile than he seems.”  
  
“I’ll take that under advisement, Detective,” says Graves, placating.  
  
Goldstein’s reply is interrupted by the rattling of a key in the lock. A pretty, blonde woman in frighteningly high-heeled boots emerges into the cramped foyer balancing an overflowing grocery bag, a wine box, and a pink patent leather purse in her arms.  
  
“Teenie, they didn’t have asparagus, I hope artichokes are okay…Oh!” she says, looking up from her lapful of groceries. “My, you’re handsome! Are you staying for dinner?” the blonde says, smiling at Graves with all the radiance of a small sun. Her voice has a soft, Marilyn Monroe-esque purr to it, but it seems completely natural rather than an affectation. Graves is fairly certain that from the corner of his eye, he sees Goldstein actually roll her eyes.  
  
“Queenie, this is my colleague, Detective Graves. Unfortunately, he was just leaving.”  
  
“Oh,” says Queenie, her pretty face crumpling up in genuine disappointment. Graves could come to like this woman.  
  
Queenie lets out a little sigh. “We never have any company for dinner…Well, except for Credence, of course. Do you think he likes sauce béarnaise?” she asks her sister.  
  
Goldstein all but shoves Graves out the door. From the other side, he thinks he can hear Queenie admonishing her for being so rude, and feels a small amount of vindication.  
  
Later, pouring himself a whisky at his writing desk, Graves’ insides writhe with anxious curiosity and vague, yet annoyingly persistent prickles of guilt. He’s fairly certain that had Goldstein not knocked on the door when she did, moments later he might have had Credence prone and pressed against that flimsy futon, preferably in a progressive state of undress and pleading for more intimate ministrations. At the very least he would have been thoroughly kissed and felt up on that tiny couch. Maybe Credence would have let him suck him off slowly, indulgently, while he watched what expressions of pleasure the boy’s gorgeous face would take, listened to the sounds he could cajole out of his lovely throat.  
  
Christ. Graves feels a hot jolt in his groin just thinking about it, and once he does think about it, it’s difficult to stop. It’s true that he wants Credence’s safety and happiness, but there’s no question about what else he wants. Despite being almost fully certain that his desires are reciprocated, it would be selfish and irresponsible to pursue them, if there’s something still unknown to him in Credence that he might break in the process. Maybe he should keep these feelings in check until he knows more about what happened to the boy at “the church”, whatever it turns out to be.  
  
The memory of the boy’s dreamy eyes and his full, red lips comes to him uninvited. _Lead me not into temptation_ , he thinks, and downs the rest of his whisky in one.  
  
—  
  
A week before Christmas, Captain Picquery asks to see Graves in her office. Ever since Graves’s return from medical leave following The Incident, the Captain has had regular talks with Graves over his recovery, his eventual return to active duty and the direction of his career. Staunch professional that she is, Captain Picquery has been endlessly patient and supportive throughout it all, and Graves is grateful. That, unfortunately, doesn’t make these meetings any more enjoyable.  
  
“Please sit down, Graves,” Picquery says, taking a bunch of heavy plastic binders off her desk and plopping them on a shelf so she doesn’t have to crane over them to see Graves. She must have been deep into some paperwork before Graves knocked. Loyal to her usual style, she gets right down to business.  
  
“Have you given any thought to what we discussed before?” Picquery asks, pen poised in her hand as if she’s about to conduct an orchestra.  
  
“I have. Still haven’t made a decision,” says Graves.  
  
“Well, you know my thoughts on this. I appreciate what you do here, and it’s not like I’m in a hurry to get rid of one of my best detectives. It’s your career I’m thinking about, Graves. You had great momentum before, no reason to let it fizzle.”  
  
“Are you saying I’m done with career progress where I am?”  
  
“I’m saying there’s more to policing than being an investigator.” Picquery taps her pen against her knee a few times in quick succession, then tosses it on the desk. “Hell, Graves, there’s more to life than policing. If you can be happy doing something else, you should…”  
  
“That’s just it, Captain,” Graves interrupts. “For me, I’m not sure there is anything else.”  
  
Picquery lets out a sigh.  
  
”Listen, I know you were well on your way to making detective first-grade one fine day. But you don’t have to see making a different choice as giving up. It would be _moving up_ , Graves, and I really believe you could accomplish great things in a different bureau.”  
  
Graves has brought his coffee mug to the meeting, just to have somewhere to keep his hands. In the absence of an answer to give to Picquery, he now takes a sip instead.  
  
Captain Picquery gives Graves an expectant look. She rubs at her brow with a knuckle. “I talked to Abernathy’s brother the other day,” says Picquery, her tone cautious. “He asked about you.”  
  
“Hmm.”  
  
“You know his family doesn’t blame you, Graves. No one does,” Picquery continues. Her eyes have that soft look that Graves has come to detest. It’s worse than the blunt evasiveness of his colleagues, because it has the power to poke holes in the thin walls he’s managed to build around the subject.  
  
“I do know that, ma’am.”  
  
Picquery sighs. “He was good police.”  
  
“He was good people,” Graves replies, quiet.  
  
Graves looks at the bullpen through the wide windows of Picquery’s office, the cops going about their business, cups of coffee leaving rings on the desks. The coffee at Abernathy’s funeral reception was served from too-small porcelain cups, looking weird in the hands of gruff cops. Half of them filled the cups from their own flasks. Graves somehow made it through the whole thing without the pain killers that made him half high, or the whisky offered from the pockets of colleagues. He didn’t make it to the wake at O’Malley’s, still wonders if people judged him for it.  
  
Lately, though, both the social aftermath from the incident and the bustle of the precinct have seemed more bearable. Graves doesn’t hate getting up in the morning and going to work, knowing that he has something better to look forward to. Being with Credence is like charging up, somehow, like Graves is slowly but surely filling with a quietly crackling energy he lacked before.  
  
Just like that, Graves makes up his mind. “Captain…I can’t say I’m sure about returning to active duty yet. But I’m not ready to throw in the towel either. Give me some time. Please.”  
  
—  
  
After New Year’s, Graves is allotted one of the precinct’s sought after offices meant for senior personnel. It’s been converted from a small interview room and has approximately the square footage of a maintenance cupboard, but it’s private. He has just finished admiring his new digs when his phone dings softly on his desk.  
  
Graves considered getting Credence a cell phone for Christmas, but feared he might find it too much or feel like he was expected to give something in return. He spent some time at the menswear department petting various cashmere sweaters that would have looked amazing on Credence, but a luxurious clothing item might have seemed an overly intimate gift. In the end, he just gave him a gift card to Barnes & Noble, a thoroughly impersonal present that was nevertheless gratefully received.  
  
It was Tina Goldstein who gifted Credence with the Android phone, complete with an unlimited data package. This has made communication between them much easier, even if it makes Graves feel strangely like he’s in a one-upmanship battle for Credence’s affections with another benefactor. He has to admit to himself that maybe the phone was more appropriate coming from someone who had no designs on Credence’s virtue (such as it may be). He does feel a little jealous that Credence celebrated Hanukkah with the Goldsteins, while Graves declined a polite invitation to his boring cousin Jeffrey’s family dinner in New Jersey and spent Christmas with his usual bah humbug tradition of Chinese takeout and Netflix. It would have been too soon to suggest spending the holidays together.  
  
_Doing anything tonight?_ Credence asks with an icon of a tiny, smiling cat. He appears to have picked up the use of ridiculous emojis in record time. The how of it is a bit of a mystery, since he can’t have that many people to exchange messages with. Graves’ money is on Queenie.  
  
_Not a thing_ , he texts back.  
  
_Want to come over?_ asks Credence.  
  
Graves has a sudden flashback to a couple of weeks before, of Goldstein more or less accusing him of…what? Being of a suspicious age and profession to be spending time with a young, impressionable thing? Cruising the neighborhood under the guise of returning lost pets? The fact that she was half right does not stop Graves from feeling mildly affronted.  
  
With the holidays in between, he hasn’t actually seen much of Credence since then, nor has he consequentially made any headway in finding out what Goldstein was talking about when she alluded to Credence’s troubled past. The thought of meeting Credence while constantly aware of being literally under Tina’s watchful eyes makes him reach a long considered decision.  
  
_Would you like to see where I live?_ he texts back.  
  
_YES_ , says Credence, with an excited smiley face. Graves texts him the address. Then, he sits in his new swivel chair at his new desk in silence, staring at the capitalized three letter word, feeling like a stupid teenager at the fluttering it causes in his stomach.  
  
—  
  
He’s replaced the missing light bulb in the hallway. He tries to think of this like all the other times he’s seen Credence, only the location is new. When was the last time someone actually came to his home? Luisa from Sunshine Services came to clean the previous Monday, but he suspects that doesn’t count. All of these jumbling thoughts come to a sudden halt when he opens the door and sees Credence standing there. He should invite him in from the cold, but his breath seems to have temporarily stopped.  
  
It’s Credence, but gone is the overgrown Beatle mop. Instead, his face is framed by a short, almost feminine cut that brings out the almond shape of his eyes and accentuates the perfect, angular symmetry of his cheekbones and his jawline. Whoever performed this magic on him knew exactly how to layer his dark, wavy hair to make him look like he’d casually stepped out of a magazine cover. His cheeks and lips are flushed pink from the cold. Graves finds him almost painful to look at.  
  
“Um, it’s kind of freezing out here. You did mean to let me actually come in?” Credence smiles, his breath making little puffy clouds in the air.  
  
Graves snaps out of his haze. “Sorry, sorry. Please, come in.”  
  
As Graves ushers him to the living room, he watches Credence’s awed expression as he takes in the high ceilings, shiny hardwood floors and tasteful furniture which was carefully picked out by an efficient and very pricey interior designer named Yvonne. It has been so long since he’s seen his house through someone else’s eyes, it’s something of a revelation to be reminded of his privilege. Stupidly, he had not even considered the vast difference between Credence’s home and his own, of how it might look to Credence.  
  
After a moment of stunned silence, Credence turns to him, eyes wide, blinking.  
  
“And this is your house? As in, you own it?”  
  
“Just this end of the house. But, yes, all three and a half stories are mine.”  
  
“Wow. I can definitely see why you prefer to hang out at mine,” says Credence, picking at the lint on his sweater sleeve the way he always does when he’s nervous.  
  
“I’m sorry,” says Graves. “I should have invited you over a lot sooner.”  
  
”That’s okay. I’m glad you invited me now,” Credence says.  
  
Graves gestures for Credence to take a seat on the couch and follows him. He can’t go longer without commenting on Credence’s appearance, but looking at the boy sitting close beside him, he finds his entire vocabulary has momentarily vanished.  
  
“So, your hair…Wow,” Graves manages.  
  
“I finally let Queenie cut it,” Credence grins, bashful.  
  
“She did a really good job,” says Graves, the bland understatement immediately making him feel like a complete coward. “What I mean to say is…You look gorgeous, Credence.”  
  
For a moment, the boy looks like he’s about to squirm out of his skin, caught halfway between flattered and flustered.  
  
“Queenie threatened to put me on Tinder. She said I’d be fending off people with a stick,” Credence finally says, shrugging at the absurd idea of his own beauty.  
  
Graves huffs out a laugh, the sound of it unfamiliar to himself. “She didn’t, though, did she?”  
  
“No. She knows there’s already someone that I…that I’m interested in,” says Credence, his words steady, measured. His eyes meet Graves’, open, earnest.  
  
And here it is, after how long he’s waited for this, for an invitation. Graves’ heart seems to have migrated to his throat, making it impossible to answer with words. Instead, he reaches to cup Credence’s face with his hand, stroking the curve of a cheekbone with his thumb, before he leans in to taste that perfect mouth.  
  
At first Credence is still, with nervousness or surprise, his lips only just parting under Graves’. As Graves gently cups the back of his neck, he melts into the kiss with a sigh, letting Graves tilt his head for better access and lick into his mouth, hot and hungry. The boy’s lips feel as soft as he’d imagined, sweet and pliant, and having learned the rhythm of the kiss, he’s responding to Graves’ every movement with equal enthusiasm, the pace growing more passionate. Graves feels the boy’s fingers come to comb through the short hair at the side of his head, sending shivers down his spine. Graves moves closer, lets his free hand gently grip Credence’s knee. At the first touch of their tongues, Credence makes a small, surprised sound of pleasure that makes Graves want to double his efforts.  
  
He slides his hand higher up Credence’s thigh, letting his thumb press on the sensitive inner thigh through his jeans. As Graves’ fingers come to nearly brush the promising bulge at his jeans, there’s a hitch in Credence’s breath. He stops Graves’ hand with his own, breaking off from the kiss, breathless. His lips are apple red, glistening from the contact. Graves desperately wants to chase them for more, but stays still, patient, as Credence swallows and seems to scramble for words.  
  
“Percy, I think I should tell you…I’ve never done this before,” he confesses, eyes cast towards their joined hands.  
  
“You’ve never been with a guy before?” asks Graves. The possibility had occurred to him, indicated by the boy’s shyness at initiating contact.  
  
Credence shakes his head, abashed, but lifts his head to look him in the eyes. “No, I mean…I’ve never done any of this. With anyone, before.”  
  
“Credence, you don’t mean…Was this your first kiss, just now?” says Graves, amazed.  
  
An amused huff escapes Credence. “Well…There were a couple of girls in high school who kissed me, but I think at least one of them did it on a dare, so it doesn’t really count.”  
  
“I just find it hard to believe. I wanted to kiss you from the moment I saw you,” says Graves, his voice coming out gravelly.  
  
There’s the boy’s familiar blushing, the biting of his full lower lip.  “Me too. It’s just…a lot, you know?” Credence says, gives Graves’ hand a light squeeze.  
  
“How about we take things slow, then. We could watch a movie?” Graves suggests.  
  
Ever since Credence found out about the existence of The Lord of the Rings film trilogy, he has mentioned wanting to see it, and Graves has no problem humoring him even though epic fantasy isn’t really his thing. He finds The Fellowship of the Ring on Google Play and they settle down to watch it.  
  
The problem is, Graves has never been less interested in the fate of Middle Earth as he is with Credence leaning against his side, almost unbearably warm, his thigh pressed against Graves’ own. And, as entranced as Credence is by the Fellowship’s quest, there’s an electric thrumming between them through it all. It’s difficult to stay still when his mere proximity to Credence seems to make Graves’ blood run south, leaving him in a restless state of half-awakened arousal as he tries to pay attention to the hobbits’ antics or the drama at Elrond’s council. They take a break to refill drinks and go to the bathroom, and Graves mentally readies himself for another two hours of rolling New Zealand scenery. When they sit down on the couch, though, Credence pauses with his hand on the remote control. He looks at Graves, biting his lower lip. Then he turns the TV off and drops the remote on the coffee table.  
  
“I thought you were enjoying that,” Graves says, voice already low.  
  
“I was. It’s just not what I feel like right now,” Credence says, as he moves to sit across Graves’ thighs, straddling his lap.  
  
They kiss like that for a while, the weight of Credence a delicious pressure on Graves’ thighs and groin. Graves’ hands keep moving up and down Credence’s back, his thighs, his sides. Then, in a move Graves feels particularly proud of, he grabs Credence by the waist and flips him on his back. The maneuver elicits a surprised giggle from Credence, quickly drowned out by more kisses from Graves.  
  
The new, horizontal position provides Graves more opportunities to explore Credence’s body. He slides his hand under the boy’s sweater and thin t-shirt, feeling the warm skin there, the thin layer of hair texturing the planes of his stomach and chest. He takes his time, feeling Credence’s breathing grow more uneven under his hand, and as Graves lets his thumbnail gently catch on a hardened nipple, he’s rewarded by a most satisfying sound that he catches from Credence’s lips. Repeating the movement makes the boy arch his back, deliciously sensitive, and Graves suddenly wants to find out what he can do with his tongue and teeth. As he goes to ruck the sweater up, Credence suddenly breaks the kiss. “Wait,” he says, breathless.  
  
“Something wrong, darling? Was I going too fast?” says Graves, gathering enough of his lust-addled brain together to ask, despite wanting to devour all of Credence then and there.  
  
“No, no, I just…” He’s looking up at Graves, hair mussed and pupils blown, trying to catch his breath. “I’d like to keep this on,” he says, tugging the sweater back down.  
  
Graves wills himself to slow down, to find his thoughts through the hot rushing of his blood to his groin. He takes Credence’s hand, presses a kiss to his palm.  
  
“Whatever you want, baby. Would you like us to stop?”  
  
“No,” Credence whispers. His hand reaches behind Graves’ neck, gently pulls him back down for another kiss, soft, tentative.  
  
“We can take it slow, if you want,” Graves murmurs against his lips, then kisses along the line of his jaw before softly nipping at his ear lobe. Credence makes a little whimpering sound at that, making Graves fervently wish he won’t have to stop.  
  
“Percy, I want…Oh,” says Credence, because Graves is now making a trail of little biting kisses down the pale column of his neck, too lovely to resist.  
  
“Sorry,” he breathes. “Please, tell me what you want, darling.”  
  
“Just touch me,” Credence pleads, his fingers clutching handfuls of Graves’ shirt at his back.  
Graves does.  
  
—  
  
Credence can’t stay the night, having Obscurus to take care of at home, but with their series of goodbye kisses, it takes him forever to actually get out the door. Graves stands in the doorway watching after him until he begins to shiver from the chill.  
  
As Graves sits at his desk the following morning and stares into space with a half-finished report and a cold cup of coffee in front of him, he can’t stop thinking about Credence. How he looked, eyes closed, fevered and blissed out, chest heaving from quickened breaths. How he gripped Graves’ shoulder hard and cried out, nearly toppling them both to the floor as he climaxed. The way he reciprocated with insecure fingers that grew more confident with Graves’ encouragement, and how Graves is sure nothing in his life has ever felt as good as Credence’s hand around him, and the warmth and the weight of Credence’s body against his own as they lay on the couch catching their breaths.  
  
It should feel like backwards progress how mostly clothed hand jobs on a couch now count as the most erotic experience of Graves’ life, but it feels like the best thing that’s happened to him in living memory. And in any case, he hopes the next time there will be fewer clothes involved. He gets out his phone and starts to write a text to Credence.  
  
—  
  
Credence returns to his place the same night, this time having arranged for Queenie to catsit. They eat dinner from Graves’ favourite Vietnamese restaurant, but there is no attempt at movie watching. Instead, once they’ve put the leftovers in the fridge, Graves takes Credence by the hand and leads him upstairs to his bedroom.  
  
“Tell me if you want to stop,” Graves tells Credence between kissing his mouth and unbuttoning his own shirt. Graves hasn’t been hitting the gym as frequently as he used to, but seeing the unmasked desire in Credence’s eyes when he tosses the shirt on a chair almost makes him feel like blushing. “You can keep yours on, if you want to,” Graves says, touching Credence’s chest.  
  
“No,” Credence breathes. “I want to feel you.” He pulls his sweater over his head, fluffing up his newly cut hair with static electricity. The sight of Credence with his pale chest and arms on display, his hair sticking up in tufts, pulls at something in Graves’ heart. He has to kiss Credence again, pulling him flush against his body.  
  
They shed the rest of their clothes, leaving them scattered on the floor in their hurry to get at each other’s skin. Graves gently pushes Credence to lie on top of soft sheets, settling over him, marveling at the expanse of pale skin under his touch. The boy responds to his every move with equal hunger, pushing up from the bed with his hips to meet Graves’ growing hardness with his own, digging his fingers into Graves’ backside. The friction is so good it makes Graves almost lose the support of his arm that’s propping him up and crash into Credence’s chest, dizzy with the sparks of pleasure hitting him from where their bodies meet.  
  
“God, you’re perfect,” he tells Credence between heated kisses. “Has anyone ever told you you’re perfect?”  
  
“You’re the first,” says Credence. “You’re the only,” he says, feverish eyes locked with Graves’, and it makes something inside him constrict and expand in ways he never thought possible. Graves pins him to the bed, claims his gorgeous mouth in another possessive kiss.  
  
After, Credence is lying in his arms, his breath softly raising goosebumps on Graves’s neck. Credence trails his fingers along Graves’ chest hair. As Graves slowly runs his hand along Credence’s spine, he can just about feel the lines of the scars under his fingertips. They’re faint and faded, most of them, a collection of white lines littered across Credence’s back.  
  
“Cree…Is this why you didn’t want to take off your shirt that first time? You didn’t want me to see?”  
  
Credence sighs, clings closer to Graves. He can feel the deep breath that Credence draws.  
  
“It’s stupid, I know. I guess I was scared you’d change your mind,” Credence says.  
  
“Change my mind? About wanting you?”  
  
“Maybe,” Credence admits softly. “But Percy, I know you’re not that kind of person. It’s just that no one has ever…” Credence tries, grasping for words.  
  
“Shh, you don’t need to explain,” Graves whispers, petting his back. They fall asleep like that, arms around each other in the safe dimness of Graves’ bedroom.  
  
—  
  
He doesn’t need an explanation, Graves tells himself during the following week when Credence spends more and more time with him, but remains quiet about the origin of the marks on his back. Surely Credence will open up about his past when he’s ready. Graves has things he has kept to himself, too, but it’s easier for him to be secretive because his past isn’t visibly written on his skin.  
  
It seemed like Credence was ready to let Graves close in more ways than one, but as intimate as they feel in Graves’ bed, the boy becomes evasive whenever Graves tries to broach the topic. “I heard Tina mention something about a church,” he tries. “Is that where you…”  
  
Immediately, Graves can see a frown begin to shadow Credence’s face.  
  
“I grew up with some bad people. I’d rather not talk about it,” he says, before he turns to pick up Obscurus, his attention abruptly focused on hugging the creature and murmuring into its batlike ears. This is what happens each time Graves approaches Credence with a careful question: Credence turns his attention to his cat, or says that it’s getting late, or goes to the bathroom, closing the door behind him with a faint click. Each time Graves tries for answers, the result feels like the sun has turned away from him and he’s been left in a cold, shadowy spot, all the warmth drawn from his cheeks. Scared of pushing Credence away, Graves stops trying to ask about it.  
  
Graves tries to let it go, wants to be able to let it go, but being a detective is at the core of his being, and this is _Credence_.  
  
This is what leads him to make the phone call.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Apologies for the unplanned long break between updates! Better late than never, I hope?
> 
> CW for chapter: referenced past child abuse.
> 
> As always, thanks to my beta Sara.

“Kowalski? Hey, it’s Graves. Yeah, been a while…No, still tied to the desk, I’m afraid.”  
  
He taps his pen against the rubbery wrist support of his ergonomic mouse pad, waiting for Kowalski to get the small talk out of his system. Something about quitting his job at Children’s Services to pursue a dream of artisanal bread, whatever in the hell that is.  
  
“That sounds great, Kowalski. I hope you get it. Listen, remember when I did that thing back in the summer and you said you’d owe me one?…Exactly. Well, I need a file on a foster kid, off the record…Yes, Jake, I know they’re sealed. Why do you think I’m asking you?”  
  
The documents he wants are not stored in an electronic database. They arrive by courier two hours later in an innocuous-looking hard envelope. No doubt once reminded of it, Kowalski was eager to get rid of his debt to Graves, in case the next favor he asks turns out to be something even more illicit or difficult to deliver.  
  
Graves rips the envelope open and pulls out a thin, brown folder with CONFIDENTIAL stamped on it. Inside he finds photocopies of the original documents, helpfully paper clipped into order by Kowalski.  
  
Credence Barebone, born 1993. No record of birth parents. Taken into custody at age five by the City of New York. Short-term stays in temporary foster homes until age eight, when placed in the permanent care of Mary Lou Barebone. Medical records are not a part of this file, with the exception of those connected to…cases of suspicious physical trauma at ages 12, 14 and 16 as reported by child health care authorities.  
  
Credence broke his left ulna at 16, an ER doctor’s report informs Graves, a so-called nightstick fracture typically caused by being hit hard on the inside of the forearm. Graves gets a momentary flash of a younger, more fragile Credence crouched on the floor, shielding himself from blows from an assailant wielding…a cane? A thin rolling pin? “Severe bruising on the arms probably exacerbated by iron and vitamin deficiencies resulting from malnutrition,” Graves reads from the impassive paper in his hand. _Jesus._  
  
Graves has to put the file on his desk and breathe to fight the sudden nausea roiling in his stomach. Credence, his sweet Credence. It seems like a miracle he survived into adulthood at all.  
  
The file continues with some patchy school records, and no further word on the abuse. The foster care documents end at age 18. Like countless other foster kids in the city, Credence aged out of the system, never officially adopted. As Graves stares at the thin stack of papers in front of him, shock and pain are quickly replaced with the much more useful feeling of fury. Who the fuck let this Barebone woman be in charge of a child?  
  
The one useful feature of Graves’ current desk job is that although he’s not technically authorized to pull up files on random persons without an open case, with the amount of information he processes daily, no one will take a second look at this transgression. He logs into the system and feeds Mary Lou Barebone’s name into it.  
  
The first thing to come up is her criminal record. Public disorder, resisting arrest, several suspected instances of child abuse (none of which resulted in so much as a hearing).  
  
The second is her death certificate and the associated investigation.  
  
Mary Lou Barebone, deceased. Cause of death: blunt head trauma and broken spinal column consistent with falling down a flight of stairs.  
  
Foster son Credence Barebone brought in and questioned on suspicion of voluntary manslaughter.  
  
Graves reads the sentence over and over, but it doesn’t begin to make sense. He reads on.  
  
Charges of voluntary manslaughter were not pressed, chiefly because Chastity Barebone’s eye witness testimony corroborated Credence’s initial statement. Modesty Barebone’s eye witness testimony was inadmissible due to the high levels of psychological distress associated with the event. The investigation concludes Mary Lou Barebone’s demise as death by misadventure.  
  
It doesn’t come as a surprise that one of the investigating officers listed is Detective Tina Goldstein.  
  
—  
  
Graves’ head is swimming with concern, guilt and helplessness. If not knowing made it difficult to navigate his newly intimate relationship with Credence, knowing is almost worse. It’s impossible to be with Credence like this, to pretend each of them isn’t being weighed down by a secret. Graves should come clean about what he knows, but keeps putting it off until the next night and the next. It never seems to be the right moment. In the end, it’s his own carelessness that makes the decision for him.  
  
A week after Graves’ illicit discovery, he is taking a shower while Credence waits for him downstairs. They’re scheduled for a Friday night movie and dinner.  
  
When Graves comes downstairs, his hair still damp, he immediately senses something is wrong.  
  
Credence is sitting on the couch. On the coffee table in front of him, there’s a brown folder with a large, stamped word on it. _Confidential_.  
  
Graves stops dead in the doorway. His lungs feel like they’re filling with icy water.  
  
“I thought I’d do something useful, so I ran the dishwasher. Or I was going to, anyway,” says Credence. His voice is a quiet monotone.  
  
He takes the folder, holds it with his fingertips like it’s made of paper cuts. “This was stuck to the bottom of a coffee mug on your desk.”  
  
“ _Fuck._ Credence, I didn’t mean for you to see—”  
  
“Why do you have this?” Credence interrupts, his face shadowed like Graves has never seen it before.  
  
Graves tries to grasp for an explanation, anything to make the truth sound more excusable, but the panic welling inside him makes all the words scatter and float away, out of his reach.  
  
“I know you asked me not to ask. But, Credence, those marks on your back…I was so worried. I had to know.”  
  
“So you did, what…a background check on me? Is that what you do to everyone you sleep with?” Credence gets up, drops the folder on the table with a sound that in the quiet of the room sounds like a slap.  
  
“No, Cree…Fuck, I just…” The inside of Graves’ head feels like it’s being filled with startled moths. For a moment, there’s only the buzzing in his ears and the sound of Credence’s quickened breathing.  
  
The boy stands between the couch and the coffee table with his eyes cast down, motionless apart from the rapid rising and falling of his chest. He seems to stare at the folder on the glass top, the white edges of the papers spilling coyly from within.  
  
“I never told you how I got Ozzy,” he says, abruptly.  
  
Graves blinks. He walks slowly to the couch, approaching Credence like a wild animal, before he sits down. “Tell me, please,” he says.  
  
Credence slowly sits down, too, carefully leaving enough space between them. He stares at his folded hands and begins to speak, his voice low and steady.  
  
“Someone left him in a pet carrier at the church’s back door. He was so thin, so dirty…He probably came from this old lady’s house a couple of blocks away, she always had more pets than she could take care of. But I knew Ma…Mary Lou would never let us keep him. So I washed him and hid him in the attic above my room. It worked for a while too, feeding him in secret, pocketing a few dollars from the donation box to buy cat food. But Oriental breeds are vocal, you know, Ozzy wasn’t quiet enough…” Credence lets out a shuddering sigh.  
  
“I came home one night and I could see something was wrong. Mod and Chastity tried to warn me, to make me leave, but she’d already seen me. Ma was…she was _calm_. I remember how much that scared me, how she just stood at the top of the stairs, waiting for me.” Credence swallows, closes his eyes, like he doesn’t want to see what he is remembering. “She said I deserved a whipping for hiding filthy creatures in her house, for lying and stealing. And she said that after she was done with my punishment, she’d make me…get rid of Ozzy. That she’d make me fill bucket with water and stand there and watch until it was done.”  
  
“Jesus,” Graves breathes. He knows where Credence’s story is headed, but it’s so much worse hearing the details than reading about it in a clinical police report.  
  
“That’s what made me stand up to her, after all those years. I couldn’t let her hurt Ozzy. She told me to take off my belt. And I could hear myself say… _No._ No.”  
  
Graves waits as Credence wraps his arms around himself, as if securing himself to be able to continue.  
  
“Ma used to talk herself into a frenzy. You could see her growing…excited, almost, the way she was at Mass sometimes.” Credence swallows. “She grabbed me, hard, and I wrenched myself free. That’s when she lost her balance and fell.” There’s a pained look in Credence’s eyes, as if he’s seeing it happen again, witnessing the uncontrolled tumble down the stairs, hearing the awful crack of his foster mother’s skull against the floor. Eventually, he lifts his head and looks at Graves. “I didn’t mean for it to happen, Percy. It was an accident.”  
  
“I know,” Graves says, quietly.  
  
“Yeah, I guess you do,” Credence says. He’s crying now, in pain or anger, Graves cannot tell. Instinctively, he reaches to touch him, but manages to stop just shy of his shoulder.  
  
“I wanted to tell you myself, so you’d know…I’m not a murderer,” Credence says, his voice cracking on the last word.  
  
“Credence, I know that! God, I would never think that you…”  
  
“Some of the other cops did, though. They tried to make me admit that I…” For a moment, he merely breathes: long, pained inhales that sound like they’re burning his chest.  
  
“They said I must have pushed her down those stairs. They kept at it for so long, they almost made me believe I did. And I was so tired in the end, I wanted to confess just so they’d let me sleep…”

Credence uses his sleeve to wipe some of the wetness off his face. Graves wants to hold him so badly, it hurts his chest.  
  
“Tina always believed me. I don’t know how it would all have ended without her.” Credence sighs. “So, now you know.”  
  
Graves stares at his profile, silent. Just as he’s about to open his mouth to say something, anything, to break into a cascade of apologies, Credence cuts him off.  
  
“I think I have to go,” he says, leaning his forehead against his palm. Graves can’t see his eyes anymore and it’s killing him.  
  
“Please, stay. Let’s talk about this,” he says, sounding desperate even to himself.  
  
“No. Percy, I need to think. I can’t think around you.”  
  
“Credence…”  
  
“Please don’t call me. I need some time.” And with that, he’s gone. He does not look back at Graves as he walks out of the room.  
  
Graves wants to move, wants to plead with him one more time, to will the door magically sealed so he can’t leave. Instead, he’s fixed to his place like a salt statue, somehow unable to even rise from his seat to follow Credence to the hallway. He hears the front door open, then close, carefully and quietly.  
  
The silence in the living room is crushing.  
  
—  
  
On Sunday morning, Graves gets up far earlier than any seriously lapsed Catholic really needs to, makes himself a pot of black coffee and wanders around his house drinking it cup by cup without being able to settle anywhere. Saturday he had spent climbing the walls until he took a sufficient dose of Ambien and fell face first on his bed. He didn't deserve the comfort of whisky, and the last thing he needed was to lose his resolve and try to call Credence. It was best to get some sleep, but you can only resort to sweet unconsciousness for so long. What was the appropriate amount of time to wait to go groveling at the feet of your hopefully-boyfriend, whose personal information you had illegally accessed by misusing your status as an officer of the law? _Percival, you colossal fuck-up,_ he thinks, grimacing at the coffee now turned bitter.  
  
God, he hopes Credence hasn’t permanently shut the door on him. After the breach of trust he committed it’s no more than he deserves, but the thought of losing Credence hurts far worse than his self-loathing. The latter, he knows, will fade quickly enough, or be locked inside some conveniently empty compartment in the recesses of his heart. It’s possible now that those hollows are fewer than before, since someone has been steadily, stealthily filling them with things like warmth, uncompromising honesty and shy smiles. If he can’t convince Credence to forgive him, all of that will trickle out like sand and the inside of his chest will match his name once more.  
  
_Graves, you royal asshole._ He has to talk to Credence. He has to.  
  
The impending avalanche of his steadily amassing despair is held back by the sound of his phone ringing. An unknown number. Normally he wouldn’t answer one, especially on a free Sunday morning, but he doesn’t want to miss the unlikely chance that it’s Credence calling from a different phone.  
  
It’s someone even more unlikely.  
  
“Graves? It’s Tina Goldstein.”  
  
He doesn’t remember ever giving her his number. It must have been Credence, for some reason or another.  
  
“What’s up, Tina?” he says, cautious.  
  
“Is Credence with you?” she asks, sounding somewhat breathless.  
  
“No, he’s not here. Is something wrong?” He feels a cold spot begin to take root inside his stomach.  
  
“Did you see him yesterday?” asks Tina, now with a thinly veiled tinge of panic in her voice. In the blink of an eye, the emotional maelstrom inside Graves is replaced with an empty space on high alert, like a busy platform suddenly cleared of passengers, flashing with warning lights.  
  
“No, I didn’t. Tina, _what’s wrong?”_  
  
“We think he…We don’t know where he is. He’s not answering his phone.”  
  
“Since when, Tina?”  
  
“He left the cat with Queenie and said he had something to do. That was yesterday morning. When he didn’t come back to get him last night, we tried calling him, but his phone is switched off. I really thought he’d be with you. Fuck.”  
  
“So it’s been about twenty four hours since Queenie saw him? Are you at your place right now?”  
  
”Yeah. Yeah, we’re here.”  
  
“I’ll be there in ten.”  
  
He’s never gotten dressed this fast. Unshaven, hair flying about his face, he rushes out the door and down the steps.  
  
As Graves half runs across the neighborhood towards Credence’s building, his mind is working on overdrive. He needs to approach this like a cop, like the detective he was before his medical leave and subsequent desk job: the man who made second grade first among his peers. _Focus, Graves. You didn’t earn those laurels for nothing._ Credence is in contact with next to no one save for Graves and the Goldsteins. Where would he go? Especially if someone had just dredged up his recent, tragic family history?  
  
The sisters. He had two foster sisters.  
  
When he reaches the Goldstein residence, he finds that Tina is already on the same page, pacing in the living room and frantically waving her phone about. Queenie is holding Obscurus for comfort, it seems, biting her lip, pale and uncharacteristically quiet.  
  
“I checked with Modesty’s new foster family, but they haven’t heard from him. They actually forbade Credence from contacting Modesty back when…” Tina swallows. “They felt it would be bad for her to be reminded of what happened.”  
  
“What happened to the older one? Chastity?”  
  
“She was over eighteen. She stayed with the Salem people, I think, but they’re no longer staying where they were. The owner of the building evicted the church six months ago, no forwarding address.”  
  
“Is there anywhere else he might go? Anyone else he knows from before?” Graves asks.  
  
Tina shakes her head, frustrated. “I’ve racked my brain and there’s nowhere I can think of.”  
  
“So, for the moment, let’s assume he’s gone to find Chastity. Which means we have to find the Salemites. Anything you know about them that might help?” Graves turns to Tina.  
  
“They seemed like a pretty unorganized bunch, but they’ve been around in some form for at least fifteen years. And they had a headquarters of sorts. Running that kind of operation requires funds, donations, so…”  
  
“That’s good,” says Graves. “If they’re an official religious community, they’ll have tax records. They’ll have a bank account.”  
  
“We’re assuming they went on after Mary Lou died, but what if they just dispersed?” notes Tina.  
  
“Have you tried just googling them?” interjects Queenie from the kitchen.  
  
Both cops turn to stare at her.  
  
“I mean, they were pretty hands-on with the evangelizing. It could have ticked people off enough to complain about it,” says Queenie.  
  
Graves sits at the open laptop perched on a doily-covered table and inserts the words ”new salem philanthropic society”, which yields nothing useful. As computer-rejecting luddites, it’s no surprise the Salemers don’t have much of an online presence.  
  
Then he tries a search for second, salem, philanthropic, society, New York.  
A bunch of stuff about gloomy Massachusetts history, a Halloween charity drive in a Manhattan school.  
  
“STOP. Back up,” says Tina.  
  
Graves scrolls up the page. Halfway through the second page of results, there’s a single Instagram photo of a young person flipping the bird and holding a yellow flier up to the camera. The caption reads _“lol no thx jesus freaks.” #secondsalem #nyc #theywereloudaf_  
  
The entry is dated two months ago. _Come and learn more at our community house in Jackson Heights, Queens,_ the leaflet urges. The framing of the photo cuts off some of the yellow paper, but shows an address in a residential area near La Guardia.  
  
God fucking bless social media and the pissed off New Yorkers who sail in her.  
  
They take Tina’s car, a compact blue Ford. Queenie stays behind in case Credence comes back.  
  
“You know, what I don’t get is why now?” says Tina, tapping her fingers on the steering wheel. The traffic is trickling like molasses, standing still for minutes at a time. Of course they’ve run into a random traffic jam on a Sunday because the universe is punishing Graves for being a jerk.  
  
“It’s been ten months since his family broke up, and he hasn’t mentioned his sisters once,” Tina continues. “Something must have happened to make him want to go looking for Chastity. Has he said anything to you lately?”  
  
Graves swallows. “Let’s just focus on finding him. We can discuss the whys and wherefores later.”  
  
Someone a few cars ahead honks their horn, an exasperated, half-hearted sound. A few others join its discordant protest.  
  
“Fuck this,” says Tina. She opens the window, plops the cherry on the roof of the car, turns on the sirens and swerves into the bus lane.  
  
—  
  
The Salem community have made their home in a private brick-built residence nestled between a Chinese supermarket and a print shop. They park across the street in front of a graffiti-covered wall.  
  
“What’s our strategy?” asks Tina. “Protect and serve or straight up battle ram?”  
  
“I thought we’d start off polite and progress from there as needed,” says Graves.  
  
Tina nods. “Let’s go.”  
  
The door is opened by a white man who looks to be in his fifties. He’s dressed like an aging hippie in corduroy trousers and an embroidered tunic, but his eyes are hard, calculating. It’s as if Bill Maher had turned to religion instead of political satire and learned how to tie dye.  
  
“Good morning, friends. How can I help you?” says Hippie Maher, offering them a beatific smile that he must have practiced daily in front of a mirror.  
  
“Good morning, sir. I’m Detective Graves, this is Detective Goldstein. We’re with the NYPD.” They flash their IDs at him.  
  
The smile vanishes along with the helpful attitude. The man is eyeing Tina with a vague air of recognition. “Yes?”  
  
“If you don’t mind, we’d like to ask you a few questions regarding a missing person,” says Graves.  
  
“And who might you be looking for?”  
  
“A young man by the name of Credence Barebone. He was a part of your community a short while ago,” Graves replies.  
  
There’s a downwards twitch at the corners of Hippie Maher’s mouth.  
  
“Credence is hardly missing. You might say he is, in fact, found.”  
  
Detectives Graves and Goldstein exchange an urgent look.  
  
“So he’s here? Can we please come inside and talk to him?” asks Tina.  
  
The man takes on a superior face, tight lipped and stern. The top landing isn’t wide enough for three people so Graves and Tina are facing him from the topmost step, a fact he takes advantage of to actually look down his nose at them.  
  
“Now, Credence returned to us of his own free will. He was a lost lamb, and has some reconciliation to do. His sins can only be atoned here, with his true family.”  
  
“We’d like to hear that from Credence himself,” Graves says, feigning patience.  
  
By now Hippie is growing belligerent. He only raises his voice a fraction, but his hands have unconsciously curled into fists, betraying both his barely controlled anger and his nervousness.  
“The answer is no. He’s taken retreat with us and as his spiritual advisor, I won’t allow his path to salvation to be obstructed,” he says, making to close the door on them.  
  
Graves is well and truly done dealing with this asshole. From the look on her face, so is Tina.  
  
“Please step away from the door, sir,” she says in a tone so foreboding that a wiser man would surely take notice. Not Hippie Maher.  
  
“Do you have a warrant?” he asks triumphantly, as if drawing an ace from his sleeve.  
  
“No,” says Graves, takes a step up and pushes him out of the way.  
  
—  
  
It’s taking Graves every ounce of his willpower not to just burst through the door and through anything else standing between him and Credence. Blood is rushing in his ears. Through the pounding on his eardrums, he can hear Tina barking questions at the hippie:  
  
_How many people inside?_ “Eleven. Some of our people are out spreading the good word.” _Any children?_ “No.” _Are there any firearms in the house?_ “What?…Now, look, ma’am, under the second amendment…OKAY! NO, no firearms.”  
  
“Graves. I think we’re clear, but better safe than something else. On three?” One, two — They enter.  
  
The short hallway behind the front door leads to the kitchen, populated by a few dumbstruck Salemites. A few more are peering in from the adjacent sitting room.  
  
“NYPD. Everyone put your hands where I can see them,” roars Tina at their stupefied faces. Most comply immediately. An Asian kid maybe a few years younger than Credence gets his arms up so fast that his yogurt cup falls on the floor, the spoon clattering messily over the linoleum.  
  
“You,” Graves points at him. “Where’s Credence Barebone?”  
  
“Uh…Upstairs. Sir. Left down the hall.”  
  
“Anyone else upstairs?”  
  
“Just Lucas. He’s with him.”  
  
“Go,” nods Tina, still keeping her weapon in hand. The congregants seem docile enough, more confused than aggressive, but they still vastly outnumber the two detectives that have descended upon them like furies.  
  
Graves takes the stairs two at a time, stopping before the top landing to look around him. The hallway is empty both ways. There are two doors on the right, three on the left.  
  
“ _POLICE._ Come out with your hands up,” he thunders.  
  
The hallway is silent. “Credence! Credence, where are you?” he calls.  
  
The door on the far left opens. A white, middle aged man in wire rimmed glasses calmly steps outside, closes the door behind him. Graves can hear it click.  
  
They’re keeping Credence in a locked room.  
  
_Deep breaths, Graves._  
  
“Who are you?” asks the man presumed to be Lucas, as if he’s not currently being pointed at with a gun.  
  
“NYPD,” Graves repeats. “Open this door.”  
  
“May I please see your credentials?”  
  
Like the hippie, this man seems to be made of slightly sterner stuff than the rest of the congregants.  
  
Graves fights the tremendous urge to use his head to break the door.  
  
He takes one step back, shows the man his ID. “Now, _open the door._ ”  
  
The man takes one more moment to look contemptuous before slowly reaching into his pocket, pulling out a key, turning it in the lock and pushing the door open.  
  
“Get inside. Hands on your head, face against the wall.”  
  
Graves steps into the room after the man, making sure he’s complying with his demands. Only then does he let his eyes scan the room and find what he came for.  
  
It doesn’t take long. Credence is sitting curled up small on a single bed in the right hand corner, staring up at Graves as if afraid to believe his eyes. Graves wants nothing more than to scoop him up into his arms, but there’s still the Salemite to worry about, and he must keep both hands free as long as his weapon is drawn.  
  
Making sure that the man is still immobile against the wall, Graves reaches with one hand to touch Credence’s face.  
  
“Credence. Are you hurt?” he asks.  
  
Credence shakes his head, seemingly unable to talk just yet.  
  
“Good. Let’s get you out of here,” Graves says. “YOU,” he then commands Lucas the Salemite. “Walk ahead of me, keep your hands on your head.”  
  
Credence doesn’t look at anyone on the way out, but stops just before they reach the door. “Wait. They took my phone. I think he has it,” Credence says quietly, nodding at Hippie Maher.  
  
Graves extends his hand. “His phone. Now.”  
  
The man quickly pulls the phone from his pants pocket and hands it over, avoiding eye contact. Graves addresses the room, directing the weight of his gaze at the two men seemingly in charge.  
  
“I suggest you take your church and leave New York. The state, not just the city. I hear Texas is great for religious fanatics. If I so much as smell you anywhere closer than Kentucky, I’ll see you prosecuted with unlawful imprisonment for starters.” With that, Graves takes Credence gently by the elbow and walks them out of the house with Tina taking the lead.  
  
They make it to the car before Credence slumps against Graves’ shoulder, drawing shuddering breaths but not crying.  
  
“I’m so sorry,” he sobs against his coat. “I just wanted to talk to Chastity. But she wasn’t here, and they took my phone, and…”  
  
“Shh, baby. It’s okay now,” says Graves, holding him tight. He’s not even sure what he is saying, but he keeps murmuring soothing words into his ear, petting his hair in slow movements.  
  
“I knew you’d come,” breathes Credence, his fingers gripping the lapels of Graves’ coat.  
  
After what feels like minutes but must only be a moment, Graves looks up at Tina. She’s leaning her hands against the car with her eyes screwed shut, holding herself together against the successive waves of adrenaline and relief. Graves can relate.  
  
“Tina. You good to drive?” he asks.  
  
Tina opens her eyes, lets out a deep breath. “Yeah. Please, let’s get the hell out of here.”  
  
They stop at the nearest gas station to call Queenie and grab a water bottle and a chocolate bar for Credence. Tina drives more easily now, occasionally glancing at the rearview mirror as if to make sure that they’ve really got Credence. He’s tucked into Graves’ side in the back seat, exhausted from fear and lack of sleep, but safe.  
  
  
—

  
Once they get back home and Queenie has hugged and fed Credence to what she deems a satisfactory degree, Tina suggests that Credence sleep in their guest bedroom that night. Graves half expects him to agree, but somewhat to his surprise and relief, he has a different wish.  
  
“Thank you, but I’d like to stay with Percy, if that’s alright with him,” says Credence.  
  
Graves had feared that the dust having settled, Credence would remember how angry and hurt he’d been only two short nights ago. It seems all that has been set aside for the moment. Graves doesn’t think he could leave Credence’s side whether his presence was wanted or not: had he decided to stay with the Goldsteins, Graves likely would have planted himself on their uncomfortable antique sofa and soundly refused to leave until the morning.  
  
The talk comes later, when they’re in the safety and silence of Graves’ living room, Credence wrapped in a blanket with a mug of cocoa in his hands, the whole bundle of him carefully arranged in Graves’ arms so as not to spill the drink.  
  
“Back there at the church, even though I was scared I had some time to think. I realized you only did what you did out of concern for me, even if it was…” Credence sighs.  
  
“Incredibly inconsiderate, ethically suspect and just plain wrong of me?” Graves supplies.  
  
“Even so, when they stuck me in that room, all I could think was, what if I never saw you again? What if…” The mug of cocoa begins to tremble worryingly, and Graves puts his hand on top of Credence’s to steady it.  
  
“After that night, when I told you the story, I just wanted to see Chastity. I thought if there was at least something about my past I could fix, the rest of it might be more bearable. But going to the house on my own…It was reckless of me. I’m sorry.”  
  
Graves pets Credence’s hand, the pleasant warmth from the mug seeping into his fingers.  
  
“You were the first person who didn’t look at me and see a tragic foster kid. I wanted you to know me first, without all the…” Credence feebly waves his unoccupied hand, trying to encompass all of his painful and complicated history in one gesture. “But it’s impossible, isn’t it? It’s not something I can separate from myself. And maybe if I’d been more open, you wouldn’t have had to look for the answers elsewhere.”  
  
“No, what I did with your files was my mistake. My bad decision. I haven't been forthcoming about my past, either. And I will tell you about it, Credence…Just not tonight.”  
  
“No, not tonight,” Credence softly confirms, leaning his head on Graves’ chest.  
  
The past few days seem like a fever dream, a chaotic jumble of actions and emotions, fear most of all. Fear of irreversible mistakes, fear for Credence’s safety, fear for his own fragile heart. But when he’s half asleep with Credence in his arms, waiting to be pulled all the way under, Graves is secure in the knowledge that the thing between them is strong enough to withstand anything that may yet remain unsaid. That in the morning he will wake up not tangled in sheets but in the warm, sleepy limbs of Credence. That there will be countless other mornings like it.


End file.
